IOU TR: July 2012

[Ignatius]

A year ago I was gearing up for a trip to MT, WY, and ID, and benefited from some good advise on here. This is the long overdue trip report.

We headed north from a Colorado that was mostly on fire, or so it seemed. First stop was the Salt, a pleasant and peaceful place:









Then the South Fork, which was less-than-stellar on that particular day due to recently raised flows. We raised martinis to compensate.


Then some place in the middle-ish part of the big rectangle, which provided what we'd been looking for.








There was a fire there too.






At 7am, of a long and outstanding day 2 on that river, things really came into focus.

Edit to add: I should note that this really was a kick-ass day, and that the absence of photos is due to the fact that I lost my camera shortly after the above photo was taken. ("In a drift boat?", you might ask? "Yeah, well....", I might answer. I'm just glad I found it the next day.) It was a 10 hour float with lots of trout, tons of heron and other wildlife, and total solitude.


It was time to push northward.


Nice mountains y'all have up there.


And then we reached nirvana, known as the Yellowstone River to some. It's hard to imagine fishing being any better, so we stuck around for 5 days. Coupla nights in Bozeman, coupla nights at Chico Hot Springs (great place!), lotta big bugs, lotta great times...










5 days of chucking just one fly, and a big one, is nice.










The last day on the Yellowstone showed signs of change. The salmon flies were getting sparse and the whitefish were getting more plentiful. So we rolled on. By this time, the crew had changed over a couple of times. But the good times remained constant.


Next up: the Madison.




Nice cattle control.


And then back to that lovely spot in the middle of Wyoming. This time on the other river.




I'm a little bummed about the timing on this photo -- 'twas a hog, I swear.


Interesting choice of rip wrap.


And that was the last of 11 or 12 days of fishing, and the second to last of 14 days on the road.


And the really great part? We're headed back again in just over a week, this time with a Smith permit in hand. (And doing rain dances double time, because it's looking kinda tight on the flows holding up for us…).

I should also note that if this TR actually works, then I'm a slacker and should have been posting stuff for ages -- this shit's easy!

[Rico in Flag]

Much excellence right there.


(Man I need to go fishing.)

[GiBo]

Dream trip. Outstanding work.

[schwerty]

You guys hit it right! Good luck on the Smith. Oe of the best rivers in the region!

[skifishbum]

page 1 quality
thanks for sharin the pursuit and catchin of the fishes stoke
good luck on the smith
hope you do a tr
thats been on my river bucket list 4 along time

[2FUNKY]

Great TR. Lots of familiar water. You got lucky on the Salmon Fly hatch on the 'Stone as it is usually big and brown.

Good luck on the Smith. I have floated it 3 times. 2 times in good flows and one was a fucking drag fest.

[Ignatius]

Yeah, we're trying to keep in mind that the Yellowstone situation we rolled into wasn't exactly typical.

Smith is at 362 right now; hoping for another bump or two in the coming days.

2FUNKY - do you recall what the flows were for your drag fest?

[2FUNKY]

Yeah, we're trying to keep in mind that the Yellowstone situation we rolled into wasn't exactly typical.

Smith is at 362 right now; hoping for another bump or two in the coming days.

2FUNKY - do you recall what the flows were for your drag fest?

It has been a while but I think it was just under 400 when we launched but that was due to a recent rain. Well we woke up from our first night and the river dropped a ton. We were in 1 hard boat and 1 raft. It was a great trip but man did we get tired of dragging. My buddies and I were sore for a couple days from it. Enjoy man, we just got a fuck ton of rain in N. Idaho that was headed over towards the Smith. Hopefully that will help you out.